


Letters to the Devil

by hawkeye47836



Category: Daredevil (Comics), Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Diary/Journal, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-04
Updated: 2020-05-04
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:53:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 740
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24009928
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hawkeye47836/pseuds/hawkeye47836
Summary: Franklin "Foggy" Nelson keeps a journal.
Relationships: Matt Murdock/Franklin "Foggy" Nelson
Comments: 5
Kudos: 40





	Letters to the Devil

Franklin "Foggy" Nelson keeps a journal.  


The journal is soft red leather, the pages thick and sturdy, the binding cracked and worn from use. When he writes in the journal, which he does every day, Foggy uses a pencil. He presses firmly, denting the paper with his loose scrawl. At the end of each day, Foggy sprays the freshly used pages with hairspray to set the graphite so that it never smears, no matter how many times the pages are handled, the letters traced, the indentations rubbed over with curious fingers or fond thumbs.

Foggy Nelson does not rub the pages of his journal.

When Foggy leaves home in the mornings, he puts his journal in his briefcase. It comes with him to the office, to the deli where he steals off for his lunch breaks, to court, and home again. At home, he sets it on the windowsill before he turns in for the night.

In the morning, Foggy Nelson picks his journal up off his nightstand, double-checks his window to ensure that it is closed and locked, and replaces the journal in his briefcase.

The notes Foggy writes in his journal are not state secrets. They are not his innermost feelings, prefaced by "Dear Diary" and punctuated with doodles of hearts. The notes in the journal are, arguably, the least interesting thing about an entirely unremarkable object. They are inconsistent, unrelated by theme or tone. They range from office gossip to personal reminders to questions addressed to no one.

"Karen was right about that new DA," reads one.

"Can't believe the roof is leaking," reads another.

"MY pens are on MY desk because they are MINE," reads one bafflingly passive-aggressive entry, seemingly written by a man who would rather vent to no one than simply tell his coworkers to return his office supplies.

Some of the journal entries are even shorter ("Why today?," "This sucks," "Please."), but many are longer, reading more like the kind of entry one would expect from a man who has been diligently keeping a journal every single day for several years.

"Today was beautiful,” the latest entry begins. The hand tracing the letters in the journal pauses briefly, resting, seeming almost to caress those words before moving on. “Honestly, today was unbelievable. I’ve gotten so used to being the underdog in court that I’d almost forgotten how good it can feel when a case comes together so smooth. Today, good triumphed over evil and the bad guy went to jail and it felt real damn good, doing something like that, something to help someone who needed the help. That’s us, I guess, Nelson and Murdock, Avocados at Law, the poor man’s Robin Hood - though really, I do all the heavy lifting. Matt never would’ve even graduated without my help.” In the darkness, the man holding the journal smiles briefly, amused. “I think the best part about winning cases and locking up bad guys is that the devil has one less nemesis, one less supervillain to hunt down and headbutt into submission with his thick skull.” 

The smile widens.

The journal entry goes on in this same vein, cracking jokes at the expense of Foggy’s legal partner and bemoaning his own rotten luck, that the neighborhood he calls home has to be plagued with “the least intelligent, most accident-prone excuse for a superhero the city has ever seen, honestly.” Crouched on the windowsill, the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen traces the letters, interpreting the firm, deliberate handwriting slowly. It’s been a habit of his for nearly as long as Foggy has been journaling.

Coming to the end of the entry, the Devil stills, his body freezing in place until he appears to be made of stone. Slowly, deliberately, he re-traces the last line written in the book once…

Twice…

Again…

In the morning, Franklin “Foggy” Nelson wakes with a solid, warm weight pressed into his back. He smiles, stretches, and climbs out of bed carefully, knowing he can’t move without waking Matt but wanting to try anyway. On the floor in front of the window - carefully closed and locked - his journal lay open, the last entry still visible.

“I don’t know why I still keep this journal. Anyone who read it would know, by now, that all the entries are the same. They all say ‘I’m worried about you.’ They all say ‘I love you.’ They all say ‘Come to bed.’

Matt, come to bed.”


End file.
